Having read a loy of great things about SunKist bees, I ordered 4 and received them a week later.Made up 4 nucs for the new Q's. I did a candy release on three and a direct release on the fourth.I was really happy to see that fourth queen walk across the frame and down followed by a lot of her new colony. After three days I checked to see if the Q's had been released all 3 had. Then I saw queen cells starting to be drawn on the side of the frame. Long story short...I lost them all! Found one Q dead on the bottom board and the others were nowhere to be found. Checked again today...day 8 no SunKist Q's but they have drawn out Q cells to make their own.I made 10 splits and requeened 5 hives last year with 1 loss(that was replaced No Charge NDA by the supplier). I'm waiting to hear from Dr. Russell.I hope those of you that have some coming have better success than I did.

Got a dozen of em little over a couple weeks ago. To early to tell anything but they are supposed to be the beez Kneez. They have all started laying up a storm so far, we will see what happens. If I notice anything in particular Ill let ya know.

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How are those SunKist doing? What did you put them in - nuc or full? How long where the hives queenless before putting the SK's in? Did you do candy release? The reason for asking all the questions is I lost 4 of 4 SunKist a couple weeks ago and after many attempts Robert got back to me saying they stand behind their queens and to let him know when I want the replacements shipped. I do not want to loose the next 4!If the other nucs I started with queens from Kohnen hadn't taken of like gangbusters I might have developed a complex! Now I'm thinking that the little southern bells I got from Robert didn't care to socialize with my northern ladies. 3 I couldn't find and 1 was dead on the bottom board with no sign of being mauled!

I started them in in small three frame nucs. I have lost a few too. This is not something rare from what I understand but has been a thing with hes bees from the number of folks I have talked to now. I have to go and take a look at them today. I have been to busy to really pay any real attention yet. I will get back to you tonight.

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The moment a person forms a theory, his imagination sees in every object only the traits which favor that theory

I received my replacement SunKist queens from Russells yesterday. All are alive and look good. I'm waiting til tomorrow to install them in my nucs.bee-nuts I watched all of your videos on youtube. I hope these SunKist perform as well as yours.I like your method for wintering. What is the silver material you put in the top? Where do you get it?By the way your mail box says it's full. Can't send you a pm.

Yeah, my sunkists turned out better than I first thought. 75% turned out nice. Others a coin flip at this point but from what I have seen from the good ones I am a happy camper. They have to make it through winter though to amount to squat to me. They do lay to full potential, I wonder though if they starve to death in a dearth. If they want to raise brood like they do now during a dearth, you would go broke feeding them, lol. I will empty pm box.

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The moment a person forms a theory, his imagination sees in every object only the traits which favor that theory

I looked up the Sunkist queens on Russell Apiaries web site, but I’m still confused. If they are such heavy layers and produce extra large colonies, isn’t that what most of us want? Why are these queens only now being offered if they’ve been using them internally for all these years? I’m not being cynical here, but if you’ve got a corvette designed and built, why wouldn’t you be selling it all along?

We also hear the number bantered around that a good queen will lay up to 2000 eggs a day (in the spring), has anybody provided a number of eggs per day a Sunkist might be expected to lay?

They do lay to full potential, I wonder though if they starve to death in a dearth. If they want to raise brood like they do now during a dearth, you would go broke feeding them, lol.

I just checked up on my 2 Sunkist hives for the first time in 10 weeks (long story). We are in a dearth right now, as just about all of summer is. The 2 Sunkist hives had more honey left over than any of the other 6 non-Sunkist hives. In addition, nearly all 6 of the other hives stopped rearing brood, waiting for a flow of some kind, but not the Sunkists. Both hives had every cell full, of either brood or honey. I don't know how they are still rearing brood without consuming the honey, but I don't really care. I'm a happy camper!

Why are these queens only now being offered if they’ve been using them internally for all these years?

Dr. Russell was selling them before. Has been for nearly three generations (or is it four now?). Only up till this year he was selling only to commercial operators. They booked his orders. He tells stories about some commercial operators that send him a blank check and write in the memo line "send whatever you can."

From what I've gathered, Dr. Russell decided to make the strains available to the general consumer, more as a betterment to the beekeeping community. He doesn't make much of the hobbiest (or sideliner, really) but he still bends over backwards to help you out, all in the name of the beekeeping community.

I have found my sunkist's to lay wall to wall both in the frames and to the wall of hive bodies, thats right all the way to the outside wall. I also noticed more honey. More bees, more honey. They build up very,very, fast.

Robert Russel's father past away this spring. His father ran the company till this season. His father only sold queens to large beekeepers and did not mess with the little guy and for good reason because he knew the P.R. nightmare it turns into. When you go from selling 100 plus queens as a minimum or whatever it was to 1 queen per customer, you have a lot more people calling demanding the status of an order. If we are lucky, we will have access to his queens next year. I will be ordering more if they winter. Even if you cant afford to buy very many, if you get two and one is a dandy, its worth breeding from as far as im concerned.

I only wish I had a yard far enough away that I could try a couple of the old a.m.m.'s

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The moment a person forms a theory, his imagination sees in every object only the traits which favor that theory